# [spirit review] Johnnie Walker Black Label



## markov (Aug 15, 2011)

One of the best known and best selling scotch blended whiskies in the world, this one is very hard to miss. The history of Johnnie Walker goes back to 1820, when John Walker started selling whiskies in his grocery shop. The business first got serious around 1860, when his sons inherited the grocery store and progressively developed and launched large range of whiskies. Whiskies of the time were based around the original Walker's Old Highland blend (1865), which is the ancestor of modern Black Label. The trademark square bottle with a label applied at an angle of 24 degrees was launched in 1870, causing fewer bottles to break during shipping and allowing bigger fonts on the label. The classic design remains largely unchanged to this day. By 1945, Johnnie Walker was already world's bestselling brand of Scotch.

The reviewed whisky came in gift packaging, featuring 2 tumbler glasses. While of nice design, they are not particularly useful when drinking whisky, as a lot of aroma is lost when using them. The glasses of choice for drinking whisky today are Glencairn and are definitely a must have for every whisky enthusiast. The gift packaging was nice and classy and the promotional bottle uses a bit different labels than ordinary packaging, but the differences are minimal. The back of the packaging boasts: "... is marked by the ability to seamlessly combine the power of the West Coast whiskies with subtlety and smoothness of the noted Mainland whiskies. Its deep fruity foreground flavours give way to dryer peaty nuances, vanilla and raisin tones and a long smooth malt driven finish." This blended whisky is bottled at 40% and uses caramel as its source of color (maybe even a little too much, as it's one of the darkest blends you can find). The ball cap is there to pervent refilling the bottles and addresses the problematic of counterfiets. Johnnie Walker Black Label is a blend of about 40 different whiskies, aged for at least 12 years. It's not hard to find popular culture references to this iconic whisky, being the favorite of Christopher Hitchens, who called it "breakfast of champions" and colonel Gadaffi among many others. Johnnie Walker has one of the most developed and complex marketing strategies in the world of whiskies and it's very hard not to come in contact with this iconic brand.

In my experience this whisky doesn't benefit from water added at all, that's why I will only give tasting notes for drinking it straight.
On the nose: smoky and fruity, quite strong and sharp. Very complex for a blend. The smokiness is there probably due to Talisker and Lagavulin, among others in the blend. There are also some speyside notes (Glendullan, Mortlach). A tiny hint of vanilla and cream, but the smoky note is the most prominent.
Tasting notes: rich, complex, smoky. A bit sharp and strong, but not unpleasant. Smooth and full bodied, with hints of dried fruits, raisins.

This is a very good blend although a little pricey. I do recommend this whisky and I give it 4/5 blended grade. No matter who you offer this whisky to or how much experience with whiskies the person has, she'll instantly be able to tell its a "good whisky" and that's what Johnnie Walker range of blends is all about.


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## TonyBrooklyn (Jan 28, 2010)

One of my favorite scotch's when i drank scotch for the money!
Thanks for the review!


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